Be a mommy (or daddy) blogger. If you haven’t used your free time between changing diapers, washing clothes and shuttling kids around to hop on the blog bandwagon, it’s worth considering this potential source of income. And just because you’re a parent doesn’t mean you have to write about parenting issues. In fact, given that there already are so many blogs about life as a mom (or dad), consider writing about another topic about which you are passionate. The more original, entertaining and informative you are, the more likely you’ll gain followers – and you need an online following to make money.
Mystery shopping can be a way to earn a little money moonlighting close to home. Also known as secret shopping, it involves pretending to be a regular customer at a business and then providing feedback on your experience to the company that hires you. That company then aggregates the feedback of multiple mystery shoppers to let the business know how it can improve. However, these types of jobs can also be the bait for work-at-home scams, so you have to be very careful and know the signs of mystery shopping scams.
One of the best things about working online is that you get to choose your own work schedule. You can work at night, during the day or even weekends. It is really up to you. This means that you will get to spend more time with your family, go for vacations, plan holiday activities, tour the world and much more. In addition, you get to live anywhere around the globe without the worry of job transfers.
If you’re a fitness buff and have the right combination of charisma and business sense, working as a part-time online personal trainer can be both physically and financially rewarding. Once you build up a reputation and client base for yourself, it could easily turn into a full-time endeavor for you. Check out this interview with several fitness blog owners who are making a living online, from MonetizePros. As well, I'd recommend checking out this resource if you want to take this business idea seriously and get started with a business plan for your personal fitness trainer business today.

You're in New York, for crap's sake. All you need is a stakeout near the Waverly Inn, a writing surface (no, not your ass—try head shots) and a great puppy-dog face. A signed Madge LP album cover can sell for $25--$1,200, Donald Trump's John Hancock can fetch about $150, and all four cast members of Sex and the City (like we'll ever see them all together again) can get about $100 on eBay and from autograph dealers. For a database of registered dealers, visit the Universal Autograph Collectors Club's website (uacc.org).

If your goal is to make enough money to retire early, prioritize earning potential over job satisfaction, since you plan on getting out of the rat race early, anyway. Consider the types of jobs that pay extraordinarily well in exchange for hard work, little psychological satisfaction, and a punishing lifestyle, such as investment banking, sales, and engineering. If you can keep your expenses low and do this for about 10 years, you can save a nest egg for a modest but youthful retirement, or to supplement your income while you do something you really love doing but doesn't pay much. But keep in mind that delayed gratification requires clear goal-setting and strong willpower.
A niche affiliate site often presents like an eCommerce store. To get started with an affiliate site, choose your niche then display products with pictures, descriptions, and prices, just as you would on an online store. However, when visitors click the ‘buy’ button, they will be taken directly to Amazon, to make the purchase. You then make an affiliate fee for sending the traffic to Amazon but have none of the packaging hassle, or initial financial output creating or buying the products.
Merch by Amazon is another service offered by Amazon that will enable you to make money online without any initial outlay. To get started you need to create an account with Merch by Amazon. Then simply design some T-shirt logos or slogans, and upload them to your Merch account. You will need to choose a T-shirt type, color, and price, and Amazon will create product pages for each T-shirt. When someone makes a purchase, Amazon takes care of production and shipping. And you are paid a royalty for your design.
Working as a freelancer is a great way to make money online from the comfort of your own home. The beauty of freelancing is that you can tailor it to suit your needs. You can freelance for a couple of hours a week in the evenings to help save up for a holiday or some much-needed home improvements. Or carve out a full-time job for yourself, giving you a more satisfying work-life balance and enabling you to do the simpler things in life like taking the kids to school. With so many jobs available online, freelancing is becoming more and more popular.
Outsourcing company Working Solutions (972-964-4800, workingsolutions.com) sets you up with a temp gig on the horn, for which you'll earn between $7.20 and $30 per hour, depending on the project—some "agents" do tech support, others take reservations. The good news is you work flexible hours and you get to wear a Madonna headset. The bad news: You'll likely be cursed at by strangers.
If you’re good with Photoshop and can work quickly you might make some decent cash with this online business. Are you a graphic designer or do you have some artistic talents that you know others are looking for? Why not make extra money for your bottom line by designing logos or other graphics for people's websites, for their newsletters or for other print applications?
Ever since the idea of online auctions came into existence, the online selling market has been on the rise. Many are interested, but don’t know how to get started. There are still all kinds of ways to make money by selling online, whether you’re selling what you already have or buying and selling like a store. Before we get started, here are a few general tips when selling anything online:

At CafePress (cafepress.com), you can create shirts, posters and bumper stickers and sell them to the site's 6.5 million users. Each item has a base price; you decide the markup. When someone buys a product, CafePress prints it and ships it, and you get a check for your total markups once a month. Tamara Remedios, whose day job is running Restaurant Week in Hoboken and Jersey City, started a popular customized T-shirt store on CafePress called Wear My Name in 2001, on which she spends about 10--15 hours a month. Her average markup is $6, and her busiest months net about 100 sales. "I put everything I make in a bank account and go on a vacation each year," she says.

The pay is .25 per minute of talk time. Agents typically make anywhere from $7-$14 per hour. As for the hours, they are totally flexible. You can choose which shifts you want to work each week and the shifts are broken down into half hour increments giving you optimal flexibility. You can even log in and work if you are not scheduled for some impromptu cash.”
Do you constantly come up with witty one-liners? Do you dream of the days of Mad Men-style advertising? If you’ve got some branding chops or just come up with imaginative copy, there are lots of opportunities to make money online through company naming and slogan contests. If you think you have a knack for names check out the Squadhelp platform where you can earn a little extra money online by naming brands, services, products, company slogans and even help out on the logo design front if you've got the chops.
Upromise puts money in your kids college funds while you do your normal spending. Yes, it's another way to make extra money or to use your own money for other goals since you're not having to save as much for your kids college. Just remember to make wise decisions with your spending. You're not spending so your kids can go to college. The Upromise contribution is a side-benefit to spending on items already in your plan.
I’ve been doing affiliate marketing for the past 6 months and it pays pretty good money. In addition to that I receive training on how to do well. The best thing about it besides getting a side income, I didn’t have to pay anything to get started. So many scams out here asking for money. If you want to make money and not spend it I have a few suggestions.
Parlay your math, science, foreign-language or test-prep expertise into a lucrative side gig by becoming a private tutor. You can tutor people online or in-person. What you charge can depend on your experience, expertise and what’s in demand. To get started, see what types of tutors are needed on Craigslist, or create a profile on sites like Tutor.com or Care.com. You can also advertise your services at local schools and community centers.
Any hobby that could potentially make money can be considered a business for tax purposes. File a Schedule C and you can deduct expenses considered "ordinary or necessary," says CPA Neil Schloss of Castle Consulting. If your business is a band, that includes the cost of equipment, practice space, transportation to gigs, even concert tickets and CDs. You're allowed two years of loss with your business, so even if you don't sell any discs, you can still save on taxes.
Take advantage of the growing delivery trend and sign up for a service like Instacart, UberEats, Postmates or Amazon Flex. You get paid per delivery, in most cases, and can even earn tips. A car isn’t always required — Postmates lets you use a bike, scooter or your own two feet to make deliveries — but a background check almost always is part of the deal. Learn more about how to get started with Amazon Flex, UberEats and Instacart.
Once you’ve had children, many parents find themselves caught in the trap of needing to work but wanting to stay home with their kids. Creating your own parenting blog can not only be a way to make some money, but it can also help you connect with other parents and make sense of those crazy sleepless early parenting years (it does get easier don’t worry!)

Focus on the surveys and offers at the top of the list. Here's a tip not many people know. CashCrate has a special algorithm that automatically selects the best surveys and offers and places them at the top of the list. There are several factors that go into determining which are the “best”, including payout, approval rate, and a variety of other factors. But all you need to know is that these surveys and offers are great, so you can do them in confidence!

If you're not self-employed and work for a company, find out if they have a retirement plan. If you're lucky, employers will sometimes match contributions you make into a retirement fund. Retirement plans also often have the benefit of being tax-deferred. The longer you get to keep your money (and make interest on it) the better. It's never too early to start planning for retirement.
In 2017, there were almost 90 million pet dogs in the US. Which has opened up a huge opportunity to make money online as a dog watcher or sitter. Specialized sites like Rover or Care.com connect pet owners with pet walkers, sitters, and boarding houses to help look after their best friends when they’re at work or on a trip. If you’re an animal lover, you can make extra money and get to spend some quality time with a furry friend.

Dating sites and apps are extremely popular and have become more and more niche as the industry develops. They can also be very profitable, as there are many ways to monetize them. You can charge a joining fee, provide premium subscriptions, or make money from advertising on your site. White Label Dating provides a pre-built dating platform for your project. You simply choose the niche and branding for your new dating site. Once your website goes live, you just need to promote it, manage the users, and collect the earnings.

Get paid to shop and share your experience. In short, stores or restaurants hire people to evaluate their services to ensure quality. Obviously, social media can impact a brand when a customer isn’t taken care of well. Mystery shoppers help prevent this from happening. As a mystery shopper, you’re compensated to provide impartial feedback about products and services. Your feedback may very well prevent the next social media rant. We’ve devoted an entire article to Mystery Shopping that you can read about here.
Multi-vendor marketplaces, like ThemeForest, can be very successful. Chose a niche and create a vendor website for it. Your marketplace could be anything, from a platform for local artists to sell their work on, to an online digital product store. Once set up, invite people in that industry to sell their products on your site. You take a percentage of their profits when items sell.
Daily Surveys can be taken one or more times per day. This is indicated in the survey description. Other targeted surveys can be taken as you see them. Be sure to complete these when you see them. Some surveys may accept a limited number of responses from people matching your demographics, and can sometimes disappear quickly. New surveys come out all the time too!
Landscape. Look for brush-clearing, mowing, or woodcutting jobs, some of which may land you regular customers. This can save you money at the same time: if you are hired to pick up pine needles, use them to mulch your roses, which will appreciate their acidity and smothering effect on weeds; if you are hired to cut and clear a fallen tree, use it to heat your house that winter.
It works essentially the same way as the phone apps do above. If you don’t care to let Google know what you do on a daily basis, you can make money from home by letting them monitor your Internet usage. They use the information they gather to help them market/increase the functionality of their advertising programs when targeting users that are similar to you.

At CafePress (cafepress.com), you can create shirts, posters and bumper stickers and sell them to the site's 6.5 million users. Each item has a base price; you decide the markup. When someone buys a product, CafePress prints it and ships it, and you get a check for your total markups once a month. Tamara Remedios, whose day job is running Restaurant Week in Hoboken and Jersey City, started a popular customized T-shirt store on CafePress called Wear My Name in 2001, on which she spends about 10--15 hours a month. Her average markup is $6, and her busiest months net about 100 sales. "I put everything I make in a bank account and go on a vacation each year," she says.

It works essentially the same way as the phone apps do above. If you don’t care to let Google know what you do on a daily basis, you can make money from home by letting them monitor your Internet usage. They use the information they gather to help them market/increase the functionality of their advertising programs when targeting users that are similar to you.
Start analyzing your decisions from the perspective of a firm. In economics, a firm's goal is simply to maximize profit. Well-run firms spend money only if they can expect to make more money from their investment, and they allocate their resources to the most profitable use. You're not a firm, of course, and you have other considerations, but if you make the majority of your time and money decisions by choosing the options that promise the highest return on investment, you'll likely earn more money, and that's good news for your shareholders (you and your family).
If you have a background in marketing and a passion for a particular niche, then organizing a virtual event may be just up your street. A virtual event could span across a day or longer. Individual live sessions would be run by experts in the field. And conference features would include live question and answer sessions, forums, and plenty of free giveaways. Visitors to the virtual event would pay to attend, so the more effective your promotion of the event the more money you would make.

In fact, AirBnB recently swallowed up luxury vacation rental provider, Luxury Retreats, and other consolidations in the marketplace have happened with leading sites like InvitedHome's acquisition of PPG rentals and Seasoned Dreams' platforms, and Expedia's $3.9 billion acquisition of another vacation rental giant, HomeAway. The market is booming and the time is ripe for entry, no matter how big or small your home or condo might be.

Great article, I have tried a few over the years. I had a side business cleaning offices for years. It did great, but I hated never being able to take more than 3-4 days vacation, so I eventually gave up. I tried MTurk, but if you multiplied my earnings on an hourly basis, it was a little over $6/hr. My blog is much worse, probably less than $0.25/hr.
More and more companies and startups especially are embracing remote work—where you use online collaboration and communication tools to do your work from wherever you want. And you don’t have to be a 20-something hotshot designer or coder to reap the benefits of working remotely. Many remote positions are for customer support positions or other customer-facing positions that don’t require specialized skill sets.
Buy underpriced used books. Outfit a phone with an ISBN reading app, scan the ISBN numbers of books at used bookstores and thrift shops, and compare the asking prices with what the books are selling for on a site like Amazon. Whenever you get a good hit (which won’t be often but, since the process is fast, won’t take long, either), buy the book and resell it online. Be discreet about this, as the store managers probably won’t like what you’re doing.
Ask for a raise. If you’re unhappy with your compensation at your 9-5 job, asking for a raise is one way to beef up your bank account. Most employers offer an annual review of your work – which could be the perfect time to negotiate a higher salary or ask for better perks. If your employer doesn’t offer such an opportunity, it might be time to initiate a review yourself.
Your money is either in charge of you or you’re in charge of it, there’s no middle ground. Using some type of personal finance software can help alleviate some of that money stress and better allow you to manage your money effectively. Without it, you may just be setting yourself up for constant financial worry. Life is already tough enough and there’s no need to make it more difficult by simply hoping your money issues will all work out in your favor. Hint: they won’t.
In our local neighborhood, we've seen this service hired out to place signs in people's yards for announcements or funny pranks. Ha! If you're out and about on a Sunday you'll see plenty of people putting put signs for open houses. You'll probably have a great opportunity for this extra money idea if you can locate a neighborhood where lots of real estate agents or putting out there own signs. Wouldn't an agent rather be prepping the house for sale or doing marketing activities than placing a sign at a busy intersection? You bet and that's why outsourcing to you could work!
It doesn’t pay much, but if you’re a healthy person and want to make a bit of extra money online, the AchieveMint app will reward you for doing things like walking, tracking your food, or taking health surveys. AchieveMint works by connecting to fitness apps you might already be using like Fitbit, RunKeeper, Healthkit, and MyFitnessPal and then giving you points for certain actions. For every 10,000 points, you earn $10 with no limit on your earnings.
A service like Paribus or Earny will help you collect refunds you're owed from stores. This is a great way to potentially put some extra earnings on autopilot because you're using an innovative tool to get a refund you deserve. When you make an on-line purchase at a Paribus monitored store (you can view the retailers they monitor here), Paribus engages with the retailer on your behalf and files a claim requesting a refund. When Paribus succeeds and a retailer issues a price adjustment, you are credited funds directly onto the original form of payment or provided the equivalent amount in store credit. It is sometimes necessary for you to call the company, or fill out a form to receive that credit in addition to Paribus reaching out. Paribus provides a convenient desktop version and an iOS app with a live feed of savings. Paribus compensates us when you sign up for Paribus using the links we provided.
Not quite ready to start your own blog, but still like the idea of getting paid to write? You may want to consider trying your hand at freelance writing. Many bloggers and website owners are willing to shell out some serious cash for high quality writers. In fact, Holly Johnson from ClubThrifty.com makes over $200,000 per year from freelance work! And she has a course that teaches others how to do the same.